Hours after The Record reported Friday that Ramapo College of New Jersey inflated its SAT results, the school announced it would start submitting its scores correctly to the nation’s dominant publisher of college rankings.

Ramapo College, which has promoted its increased selectivity in recent years, excluded 22 percent of freshmen — particularly its most disadvantaged students — when reporting average SAT scores to U. S. News and World Report. Submitting only the scores of so-called “regular admits” boosted the SAT average of incoming freshman to 1165, up 52 points from the full class that entered in fall 2010.

In the competitive world of college recruiting, such an increase can make a difference to prospective students’ impressions about a school.

News about Ramapo College’s inflated SAT scores comes shortly after revelations last month about discrepancies in numbers reported by Rowan University on a fact sheet given to the media and lawmakers. Governor Christie has been pushing to have Rowan absorb the Camden campus of Rutgers University as part of a massive restructuring of the state’s higher education system. The fact sheet inaccurately made Rowan’s test data outshine Rutgers-Camden’s scores.

Ramapo spokeswoman Anna Farneski said Friday afternoon that the college would start submitting scores for the whole freshman class, as the vast majority of other colleges do.

"We will be changing our reporting procedures to U. S. News and World Report, given that they cannot accurately present the information we have previously provided within context, and to better align our practices with those of our peers," she said in an email.

Robert Morse, director of data research for U. S. News, said Friday the school’s decision was a “win-win:” families would get a fuller view of its student body, and Ramapo College would actually bump up in the rankings. Schools that do not deliver the precise data requested get penalized, and Ramapo College would no longer suffer that ding.

In the magazine’s 2012 rankings, Ramapo College is deemed No. 26 among the Best Regional Universities in America’s North.

“They will rise in the rankings by providing accurate information to consumers,” Morse said. “And it will serve the public in terms of providing an accurate picture versus a sculpted one.”

Earlier Friday, Ramapo College’s marketing department sent an email blast to “colleagues and friends” defending its past practice and saying it would consider a change.

“We have always been clear in our submission that we have chosen not to follow the format that USNWR requested,” the message said. “Accordingly, each year since 2004, USNWR placed an asterisk next to our SAT score with a statement that Ramapo does not file its data in the requested format. It has now been brought to our attention that USNWR does not include the asterisk and explanation on its ‘premium service’ website. We operated in good faith that all Ramapo data reported by USNWR would include this asterisk and explanation.”

U. S. News says that technical barriers prevent including asterisks and footnotes on the online edition.

Ramapo College officials said it had previously excluded disadvantaged students admitted through the Equal Opportunity Fund, along with some students enrolled through special criteria, such as those who excelled in arts. Ramapo officials said that readers of the rankings were mostly parents and prospective students of the “regular admit” profile, and so would find the scores of that pool most relevant.

The fact sheet compiled by Rowan used the same technique; Rowan excluded the scores of its disadvantaged freshman but included them in the Rutgers-Camden numbers. The disparity made it look like Rowan’s SATs were 100 points higher than scores at Rutgers-Camden, when actually the Rutgers campus had slightly better scores if all freshmen were included. Rowan officials blamed a mistake by a junior staffer.

When it comes to U. S. News, schools that submit data correctly have long complained they suffer in comparison to schools that deliver the wrong numbers.

Ramapo, a public four-year school based in Mahwah, was not the only institution to avoid submitting the data the way the publisher requested. Among 143 regional universities in the North, for example, 24 have asterisks in the SAT column.

For the 2012 rankings, U.S. News asked colleges to report the average combined critical reading and math scores on the SAT for incoming first-time, full-time freshman in 2010. The Record referenced those numbers with institutional reports for the13 largest colleges and universities in New Jersey, including 10 regular public four-year schools and three private ones, and found only Ramapo and New Jersey City University failed to submit data for the entire class.

A spokesman at New Jersey City University said its officials were not aware of the violation and they would look into the matter.